The Ramayana (33 page)

Excitedly, Sita called Rama and Lakshmana. The deer stood quivering, quite near her, then ran a small way off when it saw the princes coming. When Lakshmana saw the golden stag he stopped in his stride, scowling. He said to his brother, “Be careful, Rama, this is no deer. I don't know why, but I feel strangely sure that this is our old friend Maricha.”

But Sita cried, “Oh, Rama, just look at this creature. How beautiful he is. I have never wanted anything as I do this deer. He can be a companion for me here, and a wonder when we take him back to Ayodhya. I beg you, take him alive for me.”

When Rama saw the deer, he too was bewitched. How could anything so indescribably beautiful be evil? He said to Lakshmana, “Not even Indra's Nandana or Kubera's Chaitra will have a deer like this one. Look at its tongue when it feeds: like a small streak of lightning. I must capture the creature for Sita. Even I am enchanted by it; how she must want it for herself.

“Besides, if it does turn out to be Maricha, I will kill him. But if it is not the rakshasa, then Sita shall have an exquisite pet. She never asks me for anything; I can't refuse her this.”

Rama stopped speaking and stood staring at the golden stag. He gazed hard and shook his head as if to clear it.

His mouth was set tightly, and he said, “I think you may be right after all, Lakshmana. There is an evil feeling about this golden deer. The certainty grows on me also that he is Maricha. I will follow the beast, and I think kill it. All my instincts cry out warning: some great danger is very near. Keep your bow in your hand and fit it with an arrow. Watch over Sita as the mothers of the wild do their young. I will be back soon; Sita, be careful.”

As if it had understood everything he said, the stag streaked away into the woods. Bow in hand, Rama ran after it. Sita stood waving to him. Rama waved back at her a last time and was lost to view, as he plunged after the golden deer into the thicker forest around Panchavati.

 

14. The dark mendicant

His sword strapped to his waist, his bow shining in his hand, Rama chased the golden deer through the Dandaka vana. It led him along so cunningly, he grew more and more convinced it was no stag, but an enemy disguised. The deer seemed to realize he would not kill it, until he was sure it was not a deer. It would stop in its tracks, gleaming under the trees of the dim forest. It would let him come quite close; then his heart would soften, seeing what a lovely creature it was, its eyes so soulful. But just as he drew near enough to make a spring and take it, the golden stag would prance away deeper into the forest, even as if it mocked him.

So the chase went on. The deer led Rama farther and farther from the asrama. It tantalized him by vanishing; he thought he had lost it and turned back. Then he glimpsed a flash of gold from behind a tree, like a crack of the moon through dark clouds, and he was off after it again.

An hour of this and Rama was convinced a rakshasa was leading him on this chase. He decided to kill it the next time it showed itself. If it was a creature of maya, as he suspected, an ordinary arrow would not kill the deer; and it would alert the golden thing that he had changed his mind about taking it alive. With a soft mantra, Rama drew an astra from his quiver. Now he waited; he knew it would return even if he stopped following it.

Rama stood very still beside a small clearing, and he did not have long to wait. The golden stag stepped into the glade, near enough to let him chase it again, too far to seize. Quick as a thought, Rama raised his bow and shot the astra through the creature's heart. With a horrible scream Maricha fell, his body a rakshasa's again, cut almost in two by the shaft of fire. He lay panting, dying. But before his life was gone, Maricha the sorcerer threw back his head and, in an uncanny likeness of Rama's voice, screamed piercingly, “Sita! Lakshmana! Help me!” Then he cried out again, and so convincingly because his agony was genuine.

The next moment he was dead. Hearing the rakshasa scream like that in his voice, dread gripped Rama. Some great mischief was afoot and he was so far from the asrama. Anxiety burning him, he turned and ran back at a lope.

In Panchavati, at the edge of the grove around the asrama, Sita heard Maricha scream and cried, “That was Rama. Fly to him, Lakshmana!”

But Lakshmana stood silent and would not answer her in the mood she was in. She trembled; her eyes filled with tears. Shaking him, she said angrily, “Why do you stand there as if you didn't hear Rama cry out?”

A shadow crossed her face; she backed away from Lakshmana. “O evil one!” she breathed. “So you don't love your brother, after all. You want him dead, don't you, so you can make me your wife?”

Hurt sprang into Lakshmana's eyes. He said patiently, “Sita, calm yourself. No rakshasa, Danava, gandharva, Deva, not an army of all these, can make Rama cry out like that. He will soon be back with the hide of the devil that turned himself into a golden deer.”

But Sita's eyes blazed. “You are an anarya. You are a blot on the Ikshvaku name, that you can be so calm while your brother is being killed. You have waited patiently for this Godsend, either for yourself or for Bharata's sake, pretending to love Rama while you have always been his worst enemy.

“But if you think I will ever be yours, banish the thought, Lakshmana. I will kill myself rather than let you touch me.”

Lakshmana cringed. He folded his hands to her and cried, “Sita, how can you even think this of me? The wounds of battle I can bear gladly, and arrows of fire; but not these savage words from you. I only waited here because he told me not to leave you for an instant, whatever happened. But I cannot bear to listen to you any more. I too am afraid; I feel grave danger very near. May the vana devatas preserve you from harm.”

But she only glared at him and cried, “Fly! If you want me to believe you.” Tears in his eyes, glancing back over his shoulder to see if she would relent, Lakshmana followed the awful cry into the jungle.

*   *   *

Ravana waited impatiently in a nearby thicket for Lakshmana to leave. He heard Maricha cry out in Rama's voice and a smile lit his dark lips. His uncle had served him well in his last moment. As soon as Lakshmana had gone, with just a thought Ravana transformed himself into a parivrajaka. He was a wandering mendicant, clad in ochre robes, a kamandalu and a battered umbrella in his hands, his hair matted in jata, wooden sandals on his feet, rudraksha round his neck and wrists. Only his eyes betrayed anything of what he truly was.

As night accosts evening, when the sun has set and the moon is yet to rise, Ravana came to Sita, alone in that asrama. He came softly, yet in a fever, to the door of the little hermitage and stood staring in at her. She had her back turned to him. Before he went, Lakshmana had drawn a magical line across this door, an occult rekha. It protected the doorway, so no one could enter the dwelling unless they were asked in. At this line of power, Ravana hesitated.

For the first time, the Demon saw Sita and he was inflamed. Jaded with the love of any woman he wanted casually, of the most beautiful women of all the races, it was an age since Ravana had been moved by a passion like the one that seized him now. In fact, he had never felt such desire: for never in all his years had the monster seen anyone like Sita. The very chasteness of her was fire to his blood. He was mad for her.

He knew his time was short; he coughed softly at her back. Sita whirled around with a cry, thinking Rama had returned. She had been on edge since she heard Maricha's inspired scream, and stood wringing her hands. The trees around Panchavati, and the spirits in their branches, all held their breath. The river stumbled over her bed at what Sita was about to do. She would invite the terrible mendicant inside and break the spell of Lakshmana's rekha.

Ravana stood utterly still when Sita turned and faced him. No fantasy he had of how lovely she must be had prepared him for her beauty. The moment the Rakshasa saw her face to face, whatever hope there might have been of his turning back was gone. His very soul was lost: an absolute love seized the Demon of Lanka.

He murmured some mantras from the Veda to calm himself; he had to restrain the blinding lust he felt. Sita folded her hands to the parivrajaka. If any instinct warned her that he was not what he seemed to be, it was blurred by her anxiety for Rama. Maricha's cry still echoed in her mind.

Barely keeping the hoarseness from his voice, Ravana said, “Who are you, young woman? Your skin is like burnished gold; you are as fragrant as a pool full of lotuses. Tell me, are you Parvati come unknown into this forest, or Indra's Sachi? Or Lakshmi, perhaps? Or are you Bhumi Devi, or Rati? Your teeth are pearls strung together; your body is so perfect I can hardly believe you are real. What can I say of your eyes, your face, your hair, your breasts, your waist I can hold in one hand? Save that I have never seen anyone whose beauty remotely approaches yours.

“Yet you are neither a Deva woman nor a gandharvi. Don't you know this forest is full of rakshasas? Go back to where you came from, lest any of them see you. For they are wild demons who must possess what they desire. Who are you? To whom do you belong? Tell me how you came to the vana.”

Unusual talk indeed for a mendicant of a holy order. But Sita decided he spoke in good faith, for only in good faith had all the rishis she had ever met spoken to her, though none as this one did of her charms, and so warmly. On another day, Sita would have blushed to hear him; she may have resented what he said. But today, she merely fetched a darbhasana for him, as she would for any sannyasi, and said, “Come inside, Muni, and sit down.”

At that moment, Lakshmana's rekha was broken and the forest heaved a sigh. Now fate would take its course. Ravana stepped, smiling, across the threshold. Sita had no eyes for her visitor. Time and again, her anxious gaze scanned the trees through her door to see if Rama and Lakshmana returned. Then, in her feverish state, she thought she must answer the parivrajaka's questions. She must please him, or suppose he cursed her?

Sita said, “I am Janaka's daughter Sita. I am Rama of Ayodhya's wife. Twelve years ago, Dasaratha was about to crown my husband yuvaraja. But his queen Kaikeyi held him to his word, given a long time ago for saving his life, that he would grant her two boons, whatever she wanted. She asked that Rama be banished to the Dandaka vana for fourteen years, and her own son Bharata be crowned yuvaraja.

“Have you heard of my husband Rama, my lord? He is famed for his dharma and his valor. Do be comfortable in our home. Rama and Lakshmana will return shortly and they will be happy to see you.”

He saw her eyes darted repeatedly to the open door.

Now being so close to her, hearing her husky voice, Ravana said, “Sita, have you heard of a great Rakshasa called Ravana? All the beings of the three worlds live in terror of him; his very name strikes fear in their hearts.”

He gazed at her with ineffable longing. He was wise enough to know he was a lost man. He put restraint behind him and said, “I, Sita, am Ravana of Lanka.”

And when his eyes blazed darkness, she knew he spoke the truth. Abandoning pretense, desire naked in his voice, he cried, “Since the moment I saw you, my heart has burned with a love it has never known before. Come to Lanka with me; it is a jewel in the ocean. My city is built on a mountain, and if you look out of any window, you can see azure water stretching away to the horizon. Day and night you hear the wash of the waves, like ancient song. There are gardens in my palace such as you may dream of; they are lovelier than Indra's Nandana.

“This forest life is not for you. Come with me; become my queen. From now on, my heart is yours to command.”

He spoke simply, without artifice, and Sita was angry when she saw he was completely serious. She said, “Listen to me, O king. Rama is everything to me: my life, my world, my sun, my stars. You know nothing about him; he is the greatest man alive. Your asking me to go with you is like the jackal importuning the lion's mate.

“You don't understand how dangerous your desire is. Rakshasa, go away from here. Save your life while you can, before my husband comes back and kills you.”

Now the Demon's presence unnerved her. She sensed the enormous evil of him, and sensed his desire reaching for her across the room like a beast of prey. She saw how his eyes burned. Speech ebbed from her in fright, and her limbs shook as if she was in death's presence.

Ravana saw she finally realized who he was. With a smile on his assumed features, he said slowly, “You know nothing about me, Sita; let me tell you a little. I am Visravas's son. Kubera is my brother and I vanquished him in battle. Because of me, he abandoned his city and went to live on Kailasa. I keep his pushpaka vimana in my palace.

“I am Ravana, at whose name Indra trembles and sends me tribute. Vayu blows softly on Lanka for fear of me, and Surya shines gently on my island. Is that not enough for you, my perfect Sita? Forget Rama; he is just a man.” Ravana laughed. “Just a boy, who hasn't the courage to defy his old father. What can he give a fascinating woman like you? You need a king to love you. You are born for greatness, Sita: to be my queen. Don't waste yourself; come away with me.”

Sita shivered. But hearing abjectness also in his voice, she took courage, and cried, “You say Kubera is your brother. You say the great Visravas is your father. How can you, of all people, speak like this to another man's wife? Ravana, if he sees you here, Rama's arrows will cleave your heart. Begone, Rakshasa, fly!”

How she rued everything she had said to poor Lakshmana. But it was too late for remorse. Ravana rose in anger. He clapped his hands twice and stood before her as he was in nature: a Demon, his skin shiny and his fangs bared in a smile. Ten heads, all of them terrible, stared at her. Some licked their lips, some grinned, and all the eyes on ten heads shone with lust.

In his voice deep as the sea, harsh as the wind in a desert, and grave as death, the Rakshasa said to Sita, “Once again, I beg you, accept my love willingly. Now you see who I am. I swear to you, upon my honor which moved Mahadeva himself, that never once, tender one, will I displease you in the smallest thing. I will be your slave; I will love you forever. Rama has nothing to offer you. Turn away from him, Sita: be mine from today.”